Today's second lecture was given by Canadian animation director Richard Villeneuve, who's been in the animation world for almost 30 years.

He started by introducing himself and his work. Some of the productions he's been involved in are the Heavy Metal film, FernGully film, The Tales of Beatrix Potter, The Miracle Maker film, Mabinogi, Merlin and the dragons (as part of the Animated Tales of the World series) and Digi Dragons, among others.
After screening a showreel of some of his works, Rick explained to us 10 tips related to working as a freelancer.

1- P.A.Y.E. (Pay As You Earn) working has the upside of having the security of working for a company, but it doesn't give you as much creative freedom as you have as a freelancer and you have to accept the work they give you . The downside to a freelance job is the insecurity of your income, which puts much more pressure on you and requires financial discipline and maybe an accountant for tax pursposes.

2- When selling your work you can show a portfolio, a showreel, your website, your published work or the competitions you took part of. Rick insisted that we shouldn't just focus on the digital format and he assured us that companies are still interested in seeing "physical" work, such as sketch books. He remarked the convenience of doing collaborations and joining consortiums. And he insisted that we should know our own strengths and weaknesses to be aware of our possibilities and learn how to compensate them.

3- He told us about BECTU, the independent union of broadcasting, film, theatre, entertainment, leisure and interactive media workers of the UK. He explained to us how studio systems like the ones that would teach you while you were working for them don't do that any more. Besides, he warned us about the many tests we're going to be asked to do before entering a company and suggested not to specify the salary we are willing to receive in a job interview.

4- Rick suggested that we show our enthusiasm for our job by accepting to start a placement as a runner, receptionist or dogsbody in a company we're interested in, by being enterprising and working on our own projects in our free time and by being curious about the rest of the production system apart from our working area.

5- He asserted that is good to specialize but that we must be adaptable to styles, directors and specific roles and to the studio's personality, trying to focus on our area while learning as much as we can from the rest of the production proces.

6- We must be open to new ideas, approaches and techniques and search opportunities in different fields where an artistic aspect may need to be tackled: medicine, corporations, conferences, graphic design, architecture, perfomances...

7- It's important to have a secondary activity or a "fall back" talent to turn to when work's becoming scarce, and Rick insisted in accepting a job opportunity even when we're expecting another offer, because we can never be sure of how things are going to turn up.

8- He told us to keep in touch with useful contacts such as friends or colleagues to create a network and he also said that personal recommendations give a good impression.

9- He encouraged us to keep learning by attending seminars, workshops and festivals and developing new skills.

10- And he insisted that we maintain the passion for our work and that we consider choosing the freelancing life style, though we should give ourselves a break from time to time.

Finally, he gave us a quick advice on how to present our portfolios. The first impression is most important, so the cover has to be "catchy", the portfolio must be well bound and we should put our best work in it. We must be aware of our strengths and weaknesses, as said before, and we must talk about our professional experience. We must decide carefully our portfolio's format, our presentation must be clear and concise, we may want to attach some contact details and we should bring some support material with us, like a demo reel, publications, etc.